Outburst
by cruisedirector
Summary: Bertie doesn't stammer when he's angry.


Bertie storms in after a curt knock, his expression darker than the clouds outside. "Logue," he barks by way of greeting. "Why don't I stammer when I'm angry?"

Lionel gestures for him to sit. He's just finished brewing tea, and though Bertie always refuses, Lionel pours him a cup anyway. "It isn't true for all stammerers, but I've heard a couple of theories," he says, keeping his voice conversational. It's a fine balance, with Bertie, who wants Lionel to sound as expert as possible, yet despises condescension. "Anger is such a powerful feeling that it takes us out of our usual voices, so that, like singing or mimicry, it can make us sound entirely fluent. The other theory is that the mind is so preoccupied with expressing anger that it overrides all the usual momentary hesitations and lets us blurt out what we need to say."

Bertie cocks his head, considering. He still looks furious, but there's something else - something that's making his lip quiver when he doesn't speak. "You haven't encouraged me to be angry when I have to make a speech," he snaps, the syllables crisp.

"Because it isn't practical, even if the first theory is correct and anger works like a sort of performance. It can be exhausting. And, as I'm sure you know, it's not terribly pleasant for other people." Lionel tries a genial smile, handing over the teacup, but Bertie's expression doesn't soften. "I've heard you stammer even when you've been annoyed with me. It's specifically when you're in a temper that your speech patterns change, part of which may be that you speak more quickly, without thinking. That wouldn't work when you were giving a speech. It wouldn't work very well if you were trying to have a friendly conversation, either."

Bertie's shoulders sag as he slumps back against the sofa, discarding his gloves to one side. "I didn't always have a temper," he mutters, stammering on the consonants. "My nanny used to tell me that I'd been a very sweet boy."

"By way of encouragement, or with the implication that it was a good thing you'd toughened up?"

"Encouragement, I think. She only said it when she was reproaching me for my temper. Though tantrums weren't discouraged nearly as much as tears."

Each T takes longer to pronounce than the last, and the declaration doesn't surprise Lionel in the least. "Perhaps the temper developed because it made it easier for you to speak."

"Well, it isn't worth it." Two Ws, both clear, before the fight appears to go out of Bertie again. "You're right - it's not p-pleasant for other p-people." Bertie's brow lowers. "My father had a temper. Wouldn't have tolerated us shouting at him, but _he_ shouted at _us_."

Lionel checks to be sure that his chair is at a proper distance before he sits, blowing on his tea to cool it. Bertie isn't explaining this because he wants sympathy, but perspective, and Lionel knows better than to offer an opinion concerning any member of Bertie's family, including the King who had insisted that his children should be as afraid of him as he'd been of his own father. "I suppose everyone shouts at his children from time to time - my father certainly did," he says blandly.

Bertie takes a sip of tea, pulls a face, then takes another. "I made my daughter cry," he tells Lionel.

The bleak sky outside hasn't changed, yet it's as though the light in the room has shifted, illuminating something hidden the moment before. Lionel keeps his eyes on the cup rather than Bertie's face. He doesn't have little girls, but he knows from working with them that making little girls cry can take even less effort than shouting. "Nothing too serious, I hope?" he asks, striving not to sound overly worried without making light of the confession.

"She ran into my office after a dance lesson." The poor man is fighting with every hard consonant now. "I think she wanted to jump into my arms, like - like a ballerina." Wincing, Bertie takes a gulp of the tea. "She sent my papers flying everywhere. Spilled my -" He gestures with the teacup, biting his lip, his expression slowly crumpling. "I screamed at her. Called her a s- a stu- stupid - "

He can't finish, or won't finish, covering his face with the hand that isn't shaking around the teacup. Lionel sets his own cup down so he can take the other from Bertie, whose fingers are cold despite the hot tea. Were Bertie any other patient, Lionel would take his hand and rub it between his own.

"I could say it to her," Bertie says from behind his hand, voice thick but clear. "I was angry, and I looked at - I looked right at her, my daughter, who means more to me than - I didn't stammer, and I said it, and I knew she was afraid already, and she -"

Bugger protocol. Lionel picks up Bertie's hand, squeezes it once, encounters no resistance so he doesn't release it, and after a moment Bertie's fingers haltingly return the pressure. There's an old scar running across the backs of two of Lionel's knuckles. Bertie's thumb encounters it and follows it for a moment, back and forth, as Lionel holds his breath, waiting for a question if not the squeamishness with which his youngest son used to treat the scar, not wanting to hold that hand to cross the road.

"If there's a c- a con- a link between my stammer and my temper..." Bertie raises his head. At first Lionel isn't certain he should look directly at him. He glances at the windows, spattered with rain, as Bertie retrieves his hand and pulls out a handkerchief to wipe his eyes and nose. "If there's a link, if you can cure my stammer, will it improve my temper, too?"

Lionel sighs softly. "I don't know, Bertie." He glances down at his hand, the scar faded but upraised, still sensitive from being touched. "My father was a gentle man, but he occasionally had a temper. One day my brother was having a tantrum near the table over something, I can't even remember what, and he broke a bowl - nothing valuable, we didn't have those sorts of treasures. The pieces went flying in every direction. I don't think my father meant to hit him, just to shove him out of the way so he could clean up the fragments before they scattered. He was angry and he pushed too hard. Sent my brother flying across the room. Knocked him into the cupboard. Left a bruise on the side of his face that everyone could see for months. I think my father would rather have cut his own nose off."

Bertie is looking at him oddly. At least Bertie's lips have stopped trembling. "Is that meant to make me feel better?" he asks, reaching for his teacup.

"What matters is that I adored my father. So did my brother. We'd have forgotten all about it, even how he got the bruise, if my father hadn't looked like it killed him a bit every time he noticed it. He never did anything else like that, never hit any of us. People lose their temper occasionally - even very young children know that."

Softly, mirthlessly, Bertie laughs. "You forgave him. But obviously you've never forgotten."

"I haven't thought of it in years."

It's certainly not the first or second or tenth thing Lionel thinks of when he thinks of his father, yet now it's the story that will define his father for Bertie. If there was a moment when Lionel should have chosen his late father's feelings, or his own family's feelings, over those of the man sitting on the sofa opposite him, he's let it slip, he's chosen Bertie, with the same ease with which he'll let Bertie finish his boys' models, with the same loyalty that has prevented him from mentioning Bertie to Myrtle. Meanwhile, there's Bertie on his sofa, unconcerned about Lionel's family or Lionel's good opinion, thinking only of his own little girl.

It should be an instructive moment, not one that leaves Lionel with a faint ache in his throat, as if he too has been crying over something he can never unsay. "I'm sure that when you go home, your daughter will run into your arms," he tells Bertie. "Or if she's a very sensitive soul and still upset, you can always explain. Tell her Daddy's very sorry and even adults make mistakes."

Bertie is looking not at Lionel's face, but at his hand. Reaching out, he turns Lionel's fingers toward himself, studying at the scar as Lionel suppresses a shiver. "Being angry at my father never helped my stammer," Bertie says softly. "If anything, it makes it worse. I could never say to my father or my brothers the things I said without hesitation to my precious girl. All those years I tried to prove to him that I wasn't feeble-minded, but when I do manage to speak, I prove his point for him." He gazes up at Lionel as if just realizing something. "I've said terrible things to you, too."

"All forgotten." It's easier to watch Bertie's hands than to meet his eyes. Lionel concentrates on his own breathing, stills himself as if about to walk onto a stage. "One day you'll have full confidence in your voice, and you won't need to blurt things out in anger."

Nodding, Bertie lets his fingers slide away from Lionel. "I've wasted half our time talking when I should have been working," he says ruefully.

"Talking is never a waste of time." Clearing his throat, Lionel begins to clear away the teacups. "But we should do some exercises - they'll remind you how much more control you already have."

Smiling a bit, Bertie gets to his feet. Lionel tries not to watch him too obviously as he stretches, tilting his head from side to side. Their worlds will touch only for as long as Albert Frederick Arthur George has need of Lionel's services. It is dangerous to think of this man as a friend.

"Finally," Bertie says, looking out the window. "I think weather's turning."

_Notes: Gokuma said "tears" for a drabble prompt; I may have gone a bit over the word count. Please come join us at kings_speeches on LiveJournal or at Archive of our Own if you read this fandom!_


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